- Carrier sentiment for business conditions in August 2018 was 7.43, down for the second-consecutive month from June 2018’s all-time high of 7.68. Month-to-month sentiment fell for respondents with up to 100 power units from 7.23 to 7.0, while sentiment dropped from 7.69 to 7.58 for respondents from fleets with more than 100 power units.
- Month-over-month business conditions in August 2018 stabilized, with 41.4% of all respondents saying it was better and 6.9% saying it was worse than July 2018. 58.7% of survey respondents forecast even better business conditions in the next six months while only 3.4% of respondents expect business conditions to worsen.
- 80.0% of respondents from fleets with up to 100 power units and 76.7% of respondents from fleets with more than 100 power units plan to add full-time employees in the next six months.
- 50.0% of all respondents plan to increase the size of their fleets in the next six months (55.8% of respondents with more than 100 power units and 33.3% of respondents with up to 100 power units). 3.4% of respondents plan to decrease fleet size, while 46.6% expect to replace aging equipment while maintaining current fleet size or make no change in fleet size.
- After a brief and subtle dip in early summer, driver availability matched its March 2018 mark of 93.2% as the top concern for all respondents. Freight volume and cost of labor are tied at a distant 2ndplace, each at 3.4%.
Click here to download the full August 2018 CCJ MarketPulse report.
